Golden Poppies Read online

  “I come with a letter from my ma,” he explained, “bearing sad news.”

  Momma’s hand flew to her heart, pain filled her eyes, and tears threatened to spill over. Compassion welled up in Sadie.

  “Has Mattie . . . ?” Momma asked, fear riddling her words.

  “Not yet, ma’am. But we believe it will be soon.” He held out a letter with his well-manicured hands.

  Momma’s hand shook as she took the envelope. She placed it on her lap and sighed. They sat in a bittersweet silence. Sadie could hear the tick of the clock on the oak mantel. Sadness for Momma, and for Miss Jordan, rose in her. The prospect of facing life without a mother struck a painful chord.

  “Would you like me to read the letter to you, Momma?” Sadie broke the uncomfortable silence.

  The older woman nodded. Sadie took the note and read aloud:

  Dear Lisbeth,

  I hope this letter finds you and your family well.

  I have sad news that I must share. Mama has been unable to eat for several weeks; we believe she has a growth that is preventing digestion. Naomi and I are caring for her, keeping her comfortable as best as we can. Before her illness we had decided to move to Oakland to join Malcolm, whom you have just met. He is quite enamored of your city and has convinced us we will enjoy the climate as well as the citizens.

  Mama agreed to the move, excited to see the bright poppies and, more important, your dear face. I cannot do anything about the poppies, but I can ask you to come to bring more joy and ease to her passing. Is it possible for you to make the trip to Chicago? It would mean so much to Mama, your Mattie, and to me as well.

  I understand that it may not be possible for you to make such a journey. If that is the case, will you pen a note for Malcolm to bring when he returns to Chicago?

  Fondly,

  Jordan

  Sadie finished reading the painful news with a sigh. She looked at her mother, expecting tears, but instead her jaw was set with focused determination.

  “Is it too late for me to purchase a ticket on tomorrow’s train?” Momma asked Malcolm.

  A sweet smile tugged up his lips. “Thank you, ma’am. It will mean so much to everyone.”

  Momma swallowed. “I owe you thanks for the invitation. Mattie cared for me from the day I was born. The best of me comes from her. I can never fully repay all she did”—Momma’s voice cracked—“but I can show her my devotion and gratitude by coming now.”

  Momma’s loyalty to Mattie Freedman wasn’t a surprise. The elderly woman had been more like a mother to her, caring for Momma since she was a baby. However, Momma’s intention to travel to Chicago placed Sadie in a familiar, and uncomfortable, bind. She did not want her elderly mother to journey so far alone, but her husband would not approve of her taking a long, expensive trip.

  “About that ticket.” Momma’s tone shifted again.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Malcolm replied. “I can arrange everything for you. I’ll send a porter for your bag at eight o’clock tomorrow morning. I’ll put a ticket on hold at the counter, where you can pay. Arrive by nine if you do not want to be rushed.”

  “Will there be room for two?” Sadie interjected, despite her reservations. “I’d like to accompany my mother.”

  Momma nodded with a small smile, satisfaction in her eyes.

  “Thank you, Sadie. It will be nice to have your companionship,” Momma said, “if you believe Heinrich won’t mind your absence too terribly.”

  Sadie’s heart quickened at the sound of her husband’s name. She expected Heinrich to balk at her decision to accompany her mother, though she did not know how much he would protest. He was a man of routines and showed his displeasure when they were disrupted. If she arranged for his care while she was gone, he might be more forgiving.

  “I will manage Heinrich,” Sadie declared, sounding more confident than she felt. Over their ten years of marriage she’d slowly learned how to be a good wife. Before their wedding she’d been naïve enough to think that most marriages were like her parents’ with an equal partnership between husband and wife. She had entirely underestimated the differences between her and Heinrich, an immigrant from Germany. He had many assumptions about the role of a wife that Sadie did not bring to their union.

  Heinrich did not understand Sadie’s attachment to her family. Many of their earliest disagreements centered on her desire for both of them to be close to Momma, Poppa, Sam, and his wife, Diana. He reported that his mother had few opinions and kept to herself. She had no friends or family that took her away from the house. Heinrich had not visited with any extended family during his childhood.

  They had come to a fragile peace that allowed Sadie to continue her familial relationships while giving him the freedom to stay clear of them. Sadie wished it were otherwise, but she was resigned to his attitude.

  She often reminded herself that the situation could be more painful. He might need to move back to Germany or elsewhere. Momma and Poppa had resettled from Virginia to Ohio and then to California. Heinrich had moved to a new continent for financial opportunity.

  Sadie was grateful her husband was utterly devoted to his employer, Mr. Spreckels, a fellow German who had become the sugar king of the West. Spreckels had made a fortune exporting beet sugar, fruit, and vegetables from the lush fields of California to the East. Heinrich’s work provided them a comfortable life with the income for modern luxuries like gaslights and allowed her to live near her family in Oakland.

  After a nice visit with Malcolm, Momma and Sadie said farewell and walked for twenty minutes through downtown to her brother’s home. He lived with his family on the other side of the produce district. Married for a dozen years, Sam and Diana ran a successful wholesale business together. Their three children, Tina, Elena, and Alex, showed Diana’s Greek roots in their nearly black hair and dark-brown eyes.

  Diana’s parents had refused to attend Sam and Diana’s wedding, disapproving of her marriage to an American. But after Tina was born, they forgot their objections and showered the young family with food and attention. Diana welcomed them back into their lives, never speaking of the disrespect they showed to Sam. The early struggles in her brother’s marriage had taught Sadie that compromise and strife were part of being husband and wife.

  On the way to Sam and Diana’s, Momma stopped for lemon drops, a treat for her beloved grandchildren. She bought a large stash for Sam and Diana to dole out over the many days they would be away. Sadie pushed down her envy, reminding herself that Momma would dote on her children too, if God gave her any.

  Sam and Diana lived on the bottom floor of an older duplex nestled between the estuary and Lake Merritt. A few times a year, when the breeze shifted in the wrong direction, the stench of sewage from the lake would drift into their five-room home. But most of the time it was an ideal location, close to their produce store and the amenities of city life. Both Diana and Sam had been raised on farms, and neither one missed the constant work with unpredictable outcomes.

  Instead of farming, they bought produce from the farmers in San Leandro and then paid peddlers to sell fruit and vegetables directly to customers in Oakland and the neighboring towns of Alameda and San Antonio.

  Momma walked up the clean-swept wooden porch and opened the painted wooden door on the right without knocking.

  “Hello!” she called out.

  “Come, come,” Diana yelled from the back of the house.

  They walked through the living room and dining room to get to the large kitchen.

  The delicious smell of garlic cooking in olive oil welcomed Sadie. The children swarmed around their nana, giving big hugs and receiving the sour candy. Tina, nearly eight, had lost all her baby softness but had yet to show any of the changes that would transform her into a young woman.

  Elena tugged Sadie’s hand. “Come with me to pick lemons. We’re making lemonade for supper!”

  Sadie scooped up little Alex. Despite her own lack of children, or perhaps because of her childless status,
she felt joy radiate from her chest as she held him. She kissed the top of his head, his dark hair silky and smooth. He pointed at his sister, and they followed Elena into the backyard.

  Diana and Sam’s gardening skills were on display. Rows of plant starts were beginning to take hold, delicate green leaves poking through the brown soil. A torrent of pink bougainvillea contrasted with bright golden poppies and white Shasta daisies. Tight buds of purple flowers were about to blossom on a vine. Thin leaves of crocuses made Sadie smile; the blooms had come and gone in a flash in February. These special crocuses were split from bulbs that Momma had carried from Oberlin when they moved in 1873.

  Even as a girl, only eleven years old then, Sadie had noticed the significance of those flowers when she and Momma dug them up in Oberlin, wrapped them in cheesecloth, and nestled them into wood shavings for protection on the journey. Momma had learned to hunt for crocuses from Mattie, yet another tradition that was passed from Mattie to their family.

  Each year the crocuses were the first sign of spring. In Ohio they bloomed in April or May. In Oakland they showed their purple and yellow blossoms in January or February. They’d been split and moved many times. Descendants of those ten bulbs from Ohio were planted in every yard any of them had ever lived in.

  The lemon tree was heavy with fruit. Sadie put Alex on the ground and held out her skirt as a basket. Elena harvested the produce and handed it to Alex. One at a time he set them on the outstretched cloth, the yellow of the fruit standing out from her blue cotton.

  “Mama said to get eight for the lemonade,” Elena explained. “Do you want any to take home?”

  “Yes. Thank you,” Sadie replied, impressed by her niece’s thoughtfulness. “How about four for us?”

  Elena walked over with four more in her hands. She counted, double-checking to make sure she’d finished the job. Satisfied at the number, she headed back into the house. Sadie admired the young girl’s confidence.

  In the kitchen, Diana was stirring the onion and garlic. Her black hair curled around her head, making a halo, with a few gray hairs adding a lovely contrast. Sam was finishing up the workday at their market.

  “Will you stay for supper?” Diana asked.

  Sadie shook her head as Momma nodded.

  “One more, then,” Diana declared to no one in particular.

  “Momma told you we are leaving tomorrow?” Sadie asked.

  “Yes,” Diana replied. “You need help for Heinrich?”

  Sadie nodded.

  “I’ve sent Tina to check with Cousin Lexi,” Diana said. “She’s looking for housekeeping jobs right now; the family she was working for moved away.”

  “That would be wonderful,” Sadie replied. “Thank you.”

  Diana was like that. She learned what needed to be done and just did it. After Sadie had lost her babies, Diana was the one person with whom she could fully share her sorrow. She listened and soothed without being either dismissive or too emotional. Diana understood Sadie’s pain because she’d lost a pregnancy between Tina and Elena. Sadie’s foreign sister-in-law was her dearest friend.

  Momma asked, “Diana, do you know of a means for transporting poppies for many days? Mattie had so hoped to see them. I would love to bring her some of their colorful petals.”

  Diana scrunched her face, considering possibilities. Unlike most flowers, poppies died soon after being plucked, even when placed in a water vase.

  “I have two ideas,” Diana said. “Dig up the whole root with the dirt and place it in a pot that you can water. It might make it through the journey. And take some petals pressed in a book; they won’t be the same as live ones, but can give a feel if the plant doesn’t survive the journey. In fact, I have a book for you to take on the train: Iola Leroy, by Frances Harper. You haven’t read it yet, have you?”

  Both Momma and Sadie shook their heads.

  “You know of it?” Diana asked.

  Momma shook her head while Sadie nodded.

  “It’s written by a Colored woman. The heroine of the story is mixed—Colored and White—before the Civil War. It has love, history, intrigue. You will love it!” Looking right at Momma, Diana said, “It will remind you of your childhood.”

  She left the room and returned soon with the book in her hand, which she passed to Sadie. Grabbing a cup, a paring knife, and a large spoon, she gestured for them to follow her into the back garden.

  Diana knelt on the ground in front of the riot of poppies.

  Sadie opened the book to the title page. The right page said:

  Iola Leroy,

  or

  Shadows Uplifted.

  By

  Frances E. W. Harper

  The left page had a full-size image of Miss Harper standing with her hands on a chair. She looked straight at the camera, almost in a challenge, but also confident, calm. This book’s existence was an affirmation of how far race relations had progressed since the end of the war. Sadie had never held a book written by a Colored woman.

  Diana dug deep into the moist clay soil until she loosened the long orange root of a poppy. She placed it into the tall glass cup and packed in soil around it. Two bright-orange blossoms waved over the lacy green leaves.

  “Not too much water, I think,” Diana cautioned as she handed it over to Momma’s care.

  Then she sliced three poppy flowers from their stems, took the book from Sadie’s hand, and marched back inside. Diana opened the book to the middle and smoothed the flowers against the pages, giving thought to the arrangement: one flower was wide open and the others on their sides. She closed the book and tied it shut with twine.

  “You can read it when you are there,” she declared.

  “Thank you, Diana,” Momma said. “I’m certain your efforts will bring a smile to Mattie’s face.”

  Satisfaction shone from Diana’s eyes. They heard the click of the front door.

  Tina returned, alone and panting from the half-mile run there and back.

  “She can’t come now, but Cousin Lexi says she can work as your housekeeper for as long as you like,” the girl reported.

  “That is wonderful news. Thank you, Tina,” Sadie replied. “I’d best head out to break the news to my husband.” She wanted to sound humorous, but her voice betrayed her concern. Had she known more of Heinrich’s personality at the time, perhaps she might have had a different answer to his proposal. But as it was, they were husband and wife, so she had to work around him.

  Sadie gave each child a hug long and hard enough to last for the two weeks they would be apart. She’d never gone so long without seeing them and was surprised at the powerful emotion it brought up. She walked away from her boisterous family to her quiet and orderly home.

  “A nigger knocks on our door, makes a demand of your mother, and now you are traipsing off to Chicago?!” Heinrich practically shouted at her.

  “Negro.” She corrected him in a calm voice. “The polite term is Negro. I repeat my request that you use that word when you are speaking to me.”

  Sadie sat across from Heinrich over dinner at their mahogany Chippendale table. It could open to seat twelve but none of the leaves were in it. She was glad Momma had stayed for dinner at Sam and Diana’s and was not home to see Heinrich’s reaction.

  Sadie rubbed the leaf carved into the arm of her chair. Those leaves had sold her on this set. They had ordered it all the way from Ireland, and it took months for delivery.

  “Negro, nigger,” Heinrich’s tone was measured, but his face was still bright red. “It does not matter to me what they are called. I do not understand how you are leaving for Chicago tomorrow.”

  “I have told you about Mattie and my mother’s fondness for her,” she reminded him.

  “If my very own mother were dying, I would not return to Germany to her bedside,” he declared. “The old woman does not need you to be there to die. Death will come with or without you.”

  “My mother is making the trip, and I cannot dictate her movements. I wish to acc
ompany her,” she answered, hoping she sounded resolute and calm. “We will not be gone for so long. Four days’ travel to Chicago. I expect we will return a few days later.”

  Heinrich clicked his tongue against his teeth, wordlessly expressing his objection to Sadie’s plan.

  “How will I eat? Who will take care of the house?” he challenged.

  “Diana’s cousin works as a housekeeper; she is available to take care of you,” Sadie explained.

  “Diana,” he growled, not bothering to hide his contempt. He found Diana to be overbearing and mannish. “You expect me to pay for a foreign maid? For two weeks?”

  Sadie’s confidence melted and her eyes welled up with tears.

  Heinrich tsked his disapproval. “I am not meaning to be cruel,” her husband said. “I am a rational man. We Germans are a sensible people.”

  Traveling to Chicago to see Mattie wasn’t practical, but not all of life could be decided by reason; some things were a matter of love. Heinrich didn’t agree or even understand that sentiment. The differences between them formed a persistent crack in the foundation of their marriage. She hid the fracture by keeping her family and her deepest beliefs from her husband, but this situation brought their disharmony into the open. She could not conceal a journey from him. It was impossible to simultaneously fulfill her obligations as a daughter and as a wife.

  Sadie would not change Heinrich’s mind before the morning, so she did not argue. She hoped this would be like the palm tree in which he would make a strong statement but not follow through on his demand. She expected that as long as Lexi put food on the table at the right time and kept the house running, he would be assuaged.

  Heinrich did not have the same devotion to family that she did. After her father died, Heinrich repeatedly rejected her suggestions that Momma move in with them—even though they lived in an eight-room house. In contrast, Sam and Diana welcomed Momma to join their larger family in a much smaller residence.

  Heinrich was finally won over to the idea by the assertion that Momma would be a great help with their children. But in the intervening years, there were no living children to be cared for. Sadie was failing to do what other women did so easily.